That's about $45-yikes! I guess we can take it that their much vaunted launch in the UK has not been a rip roaring success. Hardly surprising however as outside of the 'trade' no one has ever heard of them.

It sounds as though this is because of poor UK sales since the UK launch. Guess it's not something that's coming over here... though I'm in bed w/ Amazon at this point, I'd have considered this deal for my son (8).

eReading Apps
•Aldiko 2.0 – Works very well, one of the best ereading apps on the Nook Touch. Can read Adobe DRM ebooks, including library ebooks downloaded with the OverDrive app.
•Kindle – The Kindle app works well. The only downside is that there’s extra black flashing when turning pages because the animated page-turns can't be turned off.
•Nook – The Nook Android app works okay. It’s rather slow at times. The main benefit it adds over the Nook’s base reading app is landscape mode.
•Kobo – The Kobo app is buggy. Sometimes it works and other times it doesn’t.
•OverDrive – With this app you can use a web browser (Opera) to browse and download ebooks from the library directly to the Nook Touch. (The newer versions of Overdrive don't need the browser.)
•Google eBooks – This app works and has more features than the built-in app for the iriver Story HD.
•Beam Reader – A paid PDF app with basic features.
•ezPDF Reader – This is the best PDF app for the Nook Touch that I’ve tested. The one downside is excessive screen flashing.
•Moon+Reader
•Cool Reader
•FBReader
•Mantano Reader

News Apps
•Google Reader – This apps seems to work most of the time. Occasionally it force closes when trying to load an article.
•CNN – Works really well as long as you don’t mind reading white text on a black background. Page buttons work for scrolling pages.
•New York Times – Top news stories works, other sections require a subscriptions. The apps seems to work well but has very small text and scrolling can be a little awkward.
•Fox News – This app works pretty well for the most part, scrolling can be tricky at times.
•Engadget
•NewsRob
•News and Weather

More Apps
•Dropbox – Works great for wirelessly transferring files.
•Amazon Appstore – Ironically this app works great on the Nook Touch. Sometimes a download won’t work at first but it will if you keep trying.
•Opera Mobile and Opera Mini Web

It sounds as though this is because of poor UK sales since the UK launch. Guess it's not something that's coming over here... though I'm in bed w/ Amazon at this point, I'd have considered this deal for my son (8).

Maybe. Probably.

But it is a matter of record that they have a whole lot of unsold STRs lying around, dating from 2011. They're fine, hardware-wise, and make for very useful eink android tablets for those interested in those things but B&N was.... overly optimistic... about the device's appeal for the general public and bought a zillion of them. (Or maybe they're like tribbles!)

Last year they tried giving them away with digital nwspaper subscriptions, Buy-one/Get-one free, and constant price cuts. More recently they tried giving the STRs away to buyers of the Nook tablets.

What they hadn't tried, until now, was a *big* price cut.
If they match it on this side of the atlantic I might buy two or three for XMAS stocking stuffers.

It sounds as though this is because of poor UK sales since the UK launch. Guess it's not something that's coming over here... though I'm in bed w/ Amazon at this point, I'd have considered this deal for my son (8).

Actually, last week Friday I found the Nook Simple Touch with Glowlight for $79.99 at Best Buy. By Saturday it wasn't that price, so it might have been a one day thing. It was for online ordering and in store pickup only. I'm glad I grabbed it right away.